Momentum: why Mamelodi Sundowns have got Kaizer Chiefs reeling on the ropes

Play it again: Hunt and Baxter clash in the
Nedbank Cup semi-finals too

CHAMPIONSHIP form is an intangible factor in the marathon of a league title race. It is the final, breathless burst which sorts the champion from the contenders in the finishing straight; it often contradicts all that has gone before.

The football-speaking world has to pay attention when Liverpool complete a lung-bursting sprint of 11 wins on the trot; just as South Africans have to sit up and pay attention when Pitso Mosimane’s Mamelodi Sundowns go on a late run of nine successive wins.

It's not over yet, the PSL title race, but with Chiefs needing a perfect finish and praying for a late Masandawana slip-up against SuperSport or Maritzburg, Pitso will be laughing this morning.

The season-long challengers suddenly look leggy (which is exactly what Bidvest Wits coach Gavin Hunt said about Kaizer Chiefs after last night’ 0-0 draw), wearied by a season-long chase for glory: while Manchester City and Chelsea stumble, Brendan Rodgers’ reds have grasped the long-awaited bull by the horns just as Masandawana have capitalised on an AmaKhosi title defence hamstrung by a draining CAF campaign and the final stages of the Nedbank Cup.

Neither Liverpool nor Sundowns have anything else to worry about, just the titles that eluded them for so long. While Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea face Atletico Madrid in the Champions League semi-finals and Stuart Baxter’s AmaKhosi must continue the farce of a CAF Confederations Cup play-off against ASEC Mimosas (they lost the first leg 2-1 on Sunday despite a rare Matty Rusike equaliser late in the game), the new favourites have only long-awaited championship glory to bother them.

Mathematically of course, Liverpool and Sundowns have it in the bag. It’s in Anfield’s hands, with that huge clash against Chelsea to come on Sunday. At Chloorkop, with games against SuperSport United and Maritzburg to finish, full points will guarantee the title; if they draw one and Chiefs win their last three, South Africa’s top two will be level on points with goal difference the deciding factor as it was in 2011 when Orlando Pirates pipped Ajax Cape Town.

A single Teko Modise goal was enough to see off Moroka Swallows at Dobsonville on Saturday night – and Mosimane himself admits: “We should have score another one or two. It’s the same old story. 1-0; 1-0… but we get the results, we get the three points.

 “But we have to the points. We are six clear. Now let’s sit back and watch how they do.”

Exactly. Baxter accepted last night: “If our rivals can win their last two games, I’ll be the first to congratulate them. Our job is just to keep on winning, taking our chances.”

Mosimane, in a season marked by eating grass, sweating blood and weeping real tears of frustration, knows the malaise that grips South African football, a disease which has left the nation’s top scorer Bernard Parker stuck on 10 goals since February when he last score in the league against Bloemfontein Celtic. Pitso grins: “I’ll have to bring on strikers, I need goals, that’s what it will come down to.”

Goals… and momentum. Championship form. Liverpool and Sundowns are showing the elusive formula necessary to grab their respective titles. Can their rivals match it? It’s starting to feel less and less likely.

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FULL LIST OF PSL WINNERS AND POINTS TALLIES on 30-game format

2002-2003: Orlando Pirates 61, Supersport United 55

2003-2004: Kaizer Chiefs 63 (highest), Ajax Cape Town 57

2004-2005: Kaizer Chiefs 62, Orlando Pirates 60

2005-2006: Mamelodi Sundowns 57, Orlando Pirates 54

2006-2007: Mamelodi Sundowns 61, Silver Stars 51

2007-2008: SuperSport United 54 (lowest), Ajax Cape Town 52

2008-2009: SuperSport United 55, Orlando Pirates 55

2009-2010: SuperSport United 57, Mamelodi Sundowns 56

2010-2011: Orlando Pirates 60, Ajax Cape Town 60

2011-2012: Orlando Pirates 58, Moroka Swallows 56

2012-2013: Kaizer Chiefs 57, Platinum Stars 56

Roger and out: Murray lost the war with Federer, but did Andy win the battle for English hearts?

The Crying Scotsman: Andy Murray after his defeat yesterday

ANDY MURRAY may not quite have ended the 78-year British hunt for a Wimbledon champion. But he certainly ended the churlish “he’s just a dour Scot” attitude of the very average home counties English tennis fan.

After taking the first set with some panache, Murray was simply unable to stop the master Roger Federer from taking the next three as he equalled Pete Sampras’s record of SEVEN men’s singles’ titles with a rain-interupted 4-6, 7-5, 6-3, 6-4 triumph.

Murray, with both Prime Minister David Cameron and Scottish first minister Alex Salmond watching beneath the Centre Court roof – which should have been closed from the start to avoid the rain break – was a man under extreme pressure. Even David Beckham and the missus turned up. Now THAT is pressure.

Widely disliked for his off-hand attitude and his droll humour, Murray produced the best for last… with a tear-stained post-match interview at the hands of a sympathetic Mrs Tennis, Sue Barker.

For a few seconds he was fine: “I’m getting closer!” he japed, to rapturous applause from inside the stadium and the soacked masses on Murray Mount.

Then: “Firstly I’d like to congratulate Roger. After I won my semi-final I thought: ‘This is my best chance’. Roger’s not bad for a 30-year-old with a bad back! He’s still got a lot of fight left and he deserved it.”

But then Britain’s first finalist since Bunny Austin in 1938 (we won’t mention Fred Perry, our last winner in 1936) finally cracked: “I’m going to try this but it’s going to be difficult.”

Between racking sobs and flurries of tears to match the monsoon-like British summer, he said: “I’m going to try not to look at them because I’ll start crying again. But everyone in that corner who supported me through this tournament did a great job, so thank you.”

So Murray has now lost FOUR Grand Slam finals. One in New York two years ago, two on the trot in Melbourne… and an historic tilt at Wimbledon which might just have come off had he claimed one of several break points at 2-2 and 5-5 in the second set.

Federer’s mastery – he has been responsible for three of those four major defeats - became apparent at the end of the second when, having grabbed a break-point for the first time at 6-5, he grabbed the levelling set with two superb drop shots.

The Swiss darling of Wimbledon – with a mum from Kempton Park, Johannesburg – kept the post-match applause alive when he said: “Andy’s done so well over the years, he’s been so consistent. To me it shows he cares so much. I’m sure will win at least one Grand Slam.”

With this win taking him back to the world No1 spot ahead of Novak Djokovic, the man he beat in the semi-final on Friday, Federer said: “I played some of my best tennis in these last two games. That’s why I love Wimbledon.”

And SW19 loves Roger Federer. And, from this moment forth, the Crying Scotsman, St Andrew Murray.